Vitiligo - Editor's Choice

Over the years, Earth Clinic readers have sent us many reports about their treatments for Vitiligo. The editors at Earth Clinic consider the below posts to be some of the most helpful and informative and have named them 'Editor's Choice'. We hope that you will find this useful.

Zinc

Posted by Art (California) on 08/31/2020 2126 posts
★★★★★

Vitiligo is a tough disease that is not easy to treat. It causes idiopathic (unknown cause) destruction of skin pigment cells called melanocytes and creates areas of skin with little or no melanin that look much lighter compared to the rest of the skin. This can affect a person's quality of life (QOL), self esteem and in some can instigate depression, so having an option that may help ameliorate vitiligo can be useful.

Here is a link to images of vitiligo. As you can see, it would be much nicer to not have vitiligo.

On that note, this fairly recent study suggests that oral zinc supplementation may have an impact on vitiligo. The following study abstract shows that zinc serum levels are lower than in people without vitiligo and suggests that zinc supplementation may be useful. They also show a negative correlation between between serum zinc level and vitiligo. So the lower the zinc level, the worse the vitiligo will be and the higher the zinc level, the less vitiligo was expressed:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32648977/

This 2018 study also shows that zinc serum level is significantly lower in vitiligo, but goes even further and shows that increased age and duration of disease activity also results in even lower levels of zinc :

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5996627/

There are some who feel that vitiligo has oxidative stress as a major component that results in melanocyte destruction and zinc, although not normally thought of as an antioxidant, has antioxidant qualities as well as antiinflammatory qualities which is important because oxidative stress can also create inflammation. With that in mind, zinc does have some antioxidative and anti-inflammatory qualities as outlined in this study link:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4429650/

Zinc functions as an antioxidant by different mechanisms.&text=Several studies have shown that, decreases oxidative stress (32).

The following study suggests that zinc may be useful in the treatment of vitiligo:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3221203/

Art


Almond Oil and Aloe Vera

Posted by Elizabeh (Netherlands) on 09/22/2015
★★★★★

For Vitiligo: Aloe vera and or Almond oil - I have dropped all chemical products for my skin and used these. Specially on my hands and surprisingly the white spots have started disappearing. Exactly up unto the point where my long sleeve shirt starts.


Borax, Anti-Parasitic Herbs

Posted by Dj (Cleveland, Oh) on 07/14/2014
★★★★★

I wanted to share my experience in case it helps someone else. I used to hike a lot and was diagnosed with Lyme disease years ago. I never fully recovered, and later severe cellular damage was found on Spectracell tests. Then I recently discovered in a peer-reviewed paper I read that Morgellons, Lyme disease, and at least 5 other pathogens and parasites are all co-infecting and not commonly found in urine and stool tests, but in the blood, organs, deep tissue and difficult to detect or treat by traditional methods.

So I started using natural anti-parasitics (like tea tree and clove oil, neem soap, pine tar shampoo, drinking teas that are anti-parasitic from herbal plants I grow, etc.), but most helpful was simply bathing in a cup or two of natural Borax in very hot water, submerging the entire body except my eyes (and I put some drops of black tea in my eyes to kill anything there - the floaters you may see when you close your eyes which are gone now. It stings for a moment but is harmless). Since boron is naturally part of your cells you can't really have an allergic reaction, but initially the skin can turn red from the heat and from parasites dying so I drank a couple glasses of cold water afterwards.

I started improving immediately and over a period of months my vitiligo went away in addition to many of my other symptoms. I took photos as it progressed. I believe from what the journal paper found that since these parasites were observed to consume keratin cells and collagen cells (that make up Morgellon's fibers), as well as myelin sheath that surrounds nerve cells, maybe these parasites also consume the cells that produce color in our skin. Anyways, all of my symptoms continue to improve from having more energy to better skin, gray hair went away, migraine headaches are gone, I sleep better, seem to be less hungry, no more chemical sensitivity (as I believe the parasites were the ones reacting to the chemical that kills them), etc. The improvement is amazing and I can only assume it is because my cells are no longer being damaged or to a lesser degree - I will continue to use these treatments indefinitely at a maintenance dose, and hope others will find the same success as I did.


Oil of Oregano

Posted by Juliana (Washington, NJ) on 03/27/2014
★★★★★

I recommend "Oil of Oregano". I had my son use it for his vitiligo and it worked like a champ. It's been a year since, and there is no recurrance. It must be rubbed on the spot a number of times a day until it is gone. It will not happen overnight.. There must be consistency. My son used it about 4-5 times a day for 3 mths. This product is good to keep in your medicine cabinet for rashes, burns, bruises, abrasions ect. This is just a recommendation. Although I am a nurse, I am not a doctor.

Good health to you



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